precocious
/pɹəˈkəʊʃəs/
precocious adjective: characterized by exceptionally early development or maturity.
Adjective
precocious (comparative more precocious, superlative most precocious)
- Characterized by exceptionally early development or maturity.
- The precocious plant was already blooming flowers by day 4.
- Now those abominations whom you call precocious boys—your little pet monsters, doctor!—and who can wonder that the world is what it is? when it is full of them—as they will have no divine time to look back upon in their own lives, how can they believe in innocence and goodness, or be other than...1859, George Meredith, chapter 15, in The Ordeal of Richard Feverel. A History of Father and Son. […], volume (please specify |volume=I to III), London: Chapman and Hall, →OCLC
- Antonyms:
- serotinous
- Exhibiting advanced skills and aptitudes at an abnormally early age.
- The precocious child began reading the newspaper at age four.
- Mary: Even though the sound of it is something quite atrocious / If you say it loud enough you'll always sound precocious.1964, Sherman Brothers, “Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious”, in Mary Poppins, Walt Disney
- Synonyms:
- prodigious, tranty
- Antonyms:
- altricial
precocious meaning in Tamil, Bengali, Malayalam and Kannada
precocious in Tamil
- படுசுட்டி, பிஞ்சிலே பழுத்த
precocious in Bengali
- precocious
- পাকা paka
- precocious, impertinent
- অকালপক্ব okalpokko
precocious in Malayalam
- അകാല, പക്വമായ
precocious in Kannada
- ಬಾಲಪ್ರೌಢ, ಅಕಾಲ ಪ್ರೌಢ, ವಯಸ್ಸಿಗೆ ಮೀರಿ ವಿಕಾಸ ಹೊಂದಿದ, ಶೀಘ್ರ ನಿಷ್ಣಾತನಾದ
Examples of precocious in a sentence
- She's precocious and she knows just / What it takes to make a pro blush1981, Donna Weiss, Jackie DeShannon, “Bette Davis Eyes”, performed by Kim Carnes:
- Scotland’s most encouraging early source of an attacking threat was Andrew Robertson as the precocious left-back charged forward to good effect on a couple of occasions.2014 November 14, Stephen Halliday, “Scotland 1-0 Republic of Ireland: Maloney the hero”, in The Scotsman:
- Both groups, also, have already evolved precocious (intracapsular) spore germination.1992, Rudolf M[athias] Schuster, The Hepaticae and Anthocerotae of North America: East of the Hundredth Meridian, volume V, Chicago, Ill....
Synonyms of precocious
Antonyms
Forms of precocious
| comparative | more precocious |
|---|---|
| superlative | most precocious |
| alternative form (obsolete) | præcocious |
Origin of precocious
From Latin praecox (“premature, precocious, ripe before time, early ripe”), from praecoquō (“to ripen beforehand, ripen fully, also boil beforehand”), from prae (“before”) + coquō (“to cook, boil, ripen”). Doublet of apricot.
Words formed from precocious
Words that rhyme with precocious
Questions about precocious
- What does precocious mean?
- Precocious means characterized by exceptionally early development or maturity.
- What is precocious in Tamil?
- Precocious in Tamil is படுசுட்டி, பிஞ்சிலே பழுத்த. See Precocious meaning in Tamil.
- How do you use precocious in a sentence?
- She's precocious and she knows just / What it takes to make a pro blush
- What part of speech is precocious?
- Precocious is an adjective.
- How do you pronounce precocious?
- Precocious is pronounced /pɹəˈkəʊʃəs/.
Words near precocious in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: precocious (page history and authors); precocious (Tamil Wiktionary) (page history and authors); অকালপক্ব (Bengali) (page history and authors); precocious (Malayalam Wiktionary) (page history and authors); precocious (Kannada Wiktionary) (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.
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Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-precocious.wav.
Cite this entry: “precocious.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/precocious. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.